Good Father/Bad Father

A Daytona Beach father walked in on Raymond Frolander, an 18 year old family friend, allegedly raping his 11 year old son. He whipped Frolander’s a**, then called 911 for the cops to come carry the dirtbag to jail:

The father has not been charged with a crime, and police sound as if they believe his actions were justified.

‘Dad was acting like a dad. I don’t see anything we should charge the dad with,’ Daytona Beach Police Chief Mike Chitwood told WFTS. ‘You have an 18-year-old who has clearly picked his target, groomed his target and had sex with the victim multiple times.’

A subsequent mugshot showed that Frolander had been badly beaten around the face, leaving him with swollen lips and eyes, bruising and lacerations.

When the 911 responder asked the father if any weapons were involved, he said: ‘My foot and my fist’.

The 35-year-old man, who has not been identified, told a 911 dispatcher in the early hours of Friday: ‘I just walked in on a grown man molesting [name redacted]. And I got him in a bloody puddle for you right now, officer.’

The dad can be heard on the 911 call, addressing the unconscious Frolander, telling him “damn lucky boy that I love my God” — or he, the dad, would have killed Frolander.

The father who pummeled an 18-year-old man police say was sexually battering his son put his son’s picture on social media Monday and initially asked for $1 million in donations to help rebuild the child’s life.

“Rebuilding Innocence” was the headline atop a picture of a sleeping boy on a website called gofundme.com. The father posted a link to the website on his Facebook page.

A few hours after the original Facebook post Monday, however, the son’s picture was removed from the gofundme page. More description was added and the headline was changed to “Help Restore My Son’s Innocence.” And by 9 p.m. Monday, the father had pulled down the page and removed the donation campaign link from his Facebook page. It was removed after the father reduced the initial $1 million request to $100,000 and donors had contributed $145.

In a manner of speaking, he “prostituted” his raped little boy, exploiting the child’s suffering, hoping to become a millionaire. Somebody should crack him over the head.

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48 Responses to Good Father/Bad Father

Ah, so you’re suggesting that a dad who would call the cops before beating the guy into a bloody pulp would not be acting like a dad? In the light of the subsequent behaviour of the dad, do we know for a fact that the little boy was raped? (I know, I know, the two are not directly related, but still.)

Finally, how many comments will it take for someone to blame this whole episode on the homosexualist liberal agenda?

Subsequent actions suggest, on the whole, not a terribly wholesome picture.

A close friend – I actually saved him from suicide – was in the same situation, only it lasted an entire year. 18 yo son of family friend/relative, hanging out innocently (playing soccer, etc.) with the 11 yo (my friend) – my friend never remembered how it began, but only that he was raped in his own bed every time the friends/relatives were over, and he never dared mention it to his own parents out of shame. Parents were in the living room, entertaining. The whole thing would last a few minutes, and then they would go back to being “friends”, kicking the ball around and so on. “Except for the rape thing,” my friend told me, “he was like an older brother to me.”

Rod,
I don’t know that beating the guy up makes him a good dad. A normal dad? Yeah. In other words, it’s understandable (and the dad shouldn’t be charged) but it’s not justified (i.e., it cannot be something we as a society reward). How do you think he made the situation better by beating the guy up?

Is anyone troubled by the bit about “Help Restore My Son’s Innocence.”–not the attempt to raise $$$, but the suggestion that the child is now somehow defiled?

The kid was a rape victim. He’s a school-aged boy. He’s guilty of utterly nothing.

The belief in some quarters that rape victims (male or female, anal or vaginal), particularly those who lose their virginity in the process, are somehow defiled–is a belief that seriously needs to be discarded.

The child needs to be medically attended to, to make sure there’s no untreated physical injury or STD. He may or may not need psychological care after the assault.

Is it true that American law enforcement tolerates crimes of passion when retributive violence is used by a parent against any kind of abusers of their children––in general? So when this angry father killed his son’s rapist, did it matter to the police that he had done it AT THE SCENE, or if he had, in cold blood, taken revenge on the rapist, would that have been charged? I.e., was this a legal exception for a crime of passion OR for retributive justice?

I would assume that this is an honest question that deserves an honest answer. The textbook answer should be that the father was justified in taking whatever physical means were necessary to defend his son, but crossed the line to the extent that the physical means that he used were more than what wa necessary to defend his son.

With little more than a picture and press accounts to go on, it is impossible to know without venturing into guesswork and conjecture whether he crossed the line given by that dry legal definition.

I have to disagree with your glorifying the father’s violent response as the ideal. I think we can all understand his reaction, but that doesn’t mean we should appreciate it as the optimal way to handle this situation.

I think parenting in general, and particularly during a crisis, is about sacrifice. It’s about subjugating your own desires in order to serve the best interests of your child. Beating up the rapist does nothing to deter future attacks or mitigate the harm the boy has already suffered. It risks subjecting the boy’s father to criminal sanctions. It risks teaching the boy that reacting with anger and violence is an appropriate way to mediate conflict. It probably gave the father a sense of quasi-satisfaction while he was doing it.

I think we are sophisticated enough to be able to empathize with the father, even in his vicious outburst, without necessarily condoning it as a good model for how to handle this type of situation.

Rod, I wonder if your commentary here is a manifestation of what you admit is your most untamed vice, wrath. Surely, beneath that part of you that was quietly cheering this dad on when you read the story, there is a core of compassion, empathy, and Christian mercy that knows this kind of violence isn’t just, no matter how good it feels.

Florida has a statute that provides in relevant part: “A person is justified in using force, except deadly force, against another when and to the extent that the person reasonably believes that such conduct is necessary to defend himself or herself or another against the other’s imminent use of unlawful force.”

That would appear to offer a sufficient defense that prosecution would be a dicey proposition.

EngineerScotty,
That was an interesting and thoughtful post about the father’s language. Most people repeat groups of words that they have heard many times, and then apply the phrase where they think it applies, and don’t think about what the words mean. If you would speak directly to the father, I doubt he would hear what you are saying.

Some of your commenters really need to cut the sh*t, Rod. Yes, the worst thing that happened here was, of course, the beating, not the molestation. Tell me, oh wonderful net trolls, how would you have handled this situation?

It seems entirely presumptuous on the part of those here, Dreher included, to sit back and second-guess what a father does when faced with that situation. It seems such a tremendously emotional, guilt-ridden (he and the Mrs. presumably hired the perp), and enraging event that he deserves a wide berth. And he does not deserve a bunch of carping by the know-it-alls questioning his actions at the time, or even afterward with the “restoring innocence” attempt.

I have to disagree with your glorifying the father’s violent response as the ideal. I think we can all understand his reaction, but that doesn’t mean we should appreciate it as the optimal way to handle this situation.

Complaints about it as “suboptimal” are required to posit a superior alternative. Quick! An 18-year old man is raping your preteen! What should your superior response be, hero dad?

Beating up the rapist does nothing to deter future attacks or mitigate the harm the boy has already suffered.

As somebody raped as a minor: Strongly disagreed

It risks subjecting the boy’s father to criminal sanctions.

Bring it. There isn’t a peer jury on the planet that will convict, and raising internet funds for his defense is far more likely to succeed than raising funds for his son’s victimization.

It risks teaching the boy that reacting with anger and violence is an appropriate way to mediate conflict.

“If somebody else starts the assault and battery, with no end in sight, then you should end it, decisively” is, in point of fact, an appropriate way to mediate that kind of already-violent conflict. That is precisely what “calling the police” brings down, after all, except without the inexcusable fifteen minute delay of response.

Rod, I wonder if your commentary here is a manifestation of what you admit is your most untamed vice, wrath.

Rod’s self-admitted Deadliest Sin is Gluttony, not Wrath.

Surely, beneath that part of you that was quietly cheering this dad on when you read the story, there is a core of compassion, empathy, and Christian mercy that knows this kind of violence isn’t just, no matter how good it feels.

“As one sows, so shall he reap” is a bedrock principle of justice. Serial violent assault receives (far briefer) serial violent assault. It is your burden to prove that somehow justice has not been done.

Be careful if you intend to offer citations of the Gospel. Jesus never encouraged universal pacifism in the face of someone else being violated, or the entire attack on the moneylenders would never have happened. Moreover, His talk about cheek-turning involved entirely different cheeks altogether.

“after 20 years of abuse, a women shot and killed her husband. The Grand Jury wouldn’t even indict her.”
Good to hear, but I’ve heard cases going the other way. What happened to that woman charged with firing a pistol into the air to scare off her abusive husband? She was, last I heard, found guilty!
” the father was justified in taking whatever physical means were necessary to defend his son, but crossed the line to the extent that the physical means that he used were more than what was necessary to defend his son.”
So then, self-defense was the legal justification, and I imagine it’s hard to draw the line and say, well, he was defending his son for the first few punches and then he wasn’t when he was kicking him, etc.

Marcus Jay: er, because the alleged rape is not the central issue of the post, the violence is. The picture is about the alleged perp who is beaten to a pulp, and Rod is saying Atta Boy to the dad because of the beating.

Your two posts register as concern trolling of the worst kind, because it implies that people here are not concerned about the alleged rape itself. They are. Everyone is. And the sun rises in the East. No debate.

M_Young:

a laboratory for the splendid neo-America that has been created by liberal intention and conservative cowardice

I’m sorry, but wtf? Liberals intentionally created a neo-America where a father beats up an alleged perp? Or we created an America in which boys are raped? Rape did not exist before liberalism? Boys were not raped?

What is your point man, other than taking a perfectly sad situation and milking it for political pointscoring?

What, in the name of all that you hold sacred, is wrong with you people?

It’s an interesting moral question. What’s the “proper” response to something like this?

I’m not sure. Part of me says that simply stopping the act and detaining the person until law enforcement arrived is the right thing to do. The other part of me wants to beat the crap out of the guy.

My Christian side suggests that it’s better to seek the ultimate good of even our enemies, so perhaps the former? I don’t see how that’s possible by inflicting physical harm and violence on someone. Punishment as an end in itself seems to suggest the perpetrator is beyond redemption.

I’m not a pacifist. I just think that violence should be used as a last resort and in those instances where it’s necessary to preserve life.

What should the dad have done? I think beating his son’s rapist to a pulp was a terrific start. Every parent misses the boat on something, and we know we’re held accountable to a degree for that, but not as accountable for things that we know. Once this father knew his son was being molested and knew who was doing it, he did something about it. In a decisive fashion.

Speaking as a past assault victim, yes, this is helpful to the victim! It reasserts boundaries, safety, right and wrong, which are all things that take a terrible beating in the grooming and abuse process.

Those of you who care more about the dad being violent than about the son being molested–what if the son were gay, and the father had walked in on an older boy calling him F—– and punching him repeatedly? I’m curious; do you feel easier about the prospect of violence in that situation? Would you encourage the dad to say, “Now, now, that’s not nice. Please leave my home.”…?

My regret is that as a short woman, if I walked in on an 18yo hurting or molesting one of my children, I wouldn’t have the option of simply beating him to a pulp. I’m not big and strong enough to finesse the correct level of violence to simply incapacitate and hold the criminal for the police when they eventually moseyed by a quarter-hour later, without outright killing him. I don’t have that option. I might end up just having to fatally shoot such a criminal.

I’d feel bad, sure, but I’m not going to tell my child, explicitly or implicitly, that my need to feel like a civilized, urbane human supercedes their need for basic bodily safety.

Complaints about it as “suboptimal” are required to posit a superior alternative. Quick! An 18-year old man is raping your preteen! What should your superior response be, hero dad?

Again, I think the father’s reaction falls within the boundaries of normal for such an emotionally-charged situation, but for those of us with some distance from the case, we needn’t fall back on our visceral impulses to determine what’s right. Obviously stopping the assault is the prime concern, and doing so in a way that precludes any additional harm to the victim or to you as his father. Inflicting superfluous harm for vengeance may or may not be part of that, but I think it’s reasonable to be suspicious that it is, rather than reflexively awarding the father a medal.

Bring it. There isn’t a peer jury on the planet that will convict, and raising internet funds for his defense is far more likely to succeed than raising funds for his son’s victimization.

Of course the criminal justice process will be sympathetic to this father, but acting with unrestrained violence still risks potential sanctions. The rapist was left unconscious from the beating. It’s not a stretch to imagine that caprice could have left him dead or permanently disabled. Maybe the father never gets jail time for this kind of incident, but even probation or some other sanction might diminish his ability to provide the best care for his son.

“If somebody else starts the assault and battery, with no end in sight, then you should end it, decisively” is, in point of fact, an appropriate way to mediate that kind of already-violent conflict. That is precisely what “calling the police” brings down, after all, except without the inexcusable fifteen minute delay of response.

Again, I’m 100% in favor of the father taking decisive action to stop the assault. Whether that requires leaving the rapist unconscious in a bloody pulp is not easy to determine, but I’m suspicious that it does. The quotes from the father betray an obvious and understandable sense of anger. It’s reasonable to attribute at least some of his actions to that anger.

Rod’s self-admitted Deadliest Sin is Gluttony, not Wrath.

My mistake, though I do know he has posted about his anger on several occasions. Admittedly, it’s a tough emotion to overcome for any of us, and perhaps some would fall into the camp that anger isn’t meant to be overcome, but to be harnessed towards better ends. Fine, but I wouldn’t put beating up an 18 year old in that category, regardless of his crimes.

“As one sows, so shall he reap” is a bedrock principle of justice. Serial violent assault receives (far briefer) serial violent assault. It is your burden to prove that somehow justice has not been done.

I’m not sure how to respond to this. A theory of justice that celebrates the intentional infliction of violence on others, for purposes other than deterrence, is hard for me to grasp. If your argument is that sometimes bad things happen to people who do bad things, then yes, I agree. And while my sympathy may be limited in those cases, I don’t understand celebrating their harm, or incorporating it into a holistic experience of justice.

I don’t want to spill too much digital ink being critical of this dad’s actions, which again I don’t have a huge problem with. But it just baffles me that some of you can interpret his actions as obviously morally superior to any other response.

Engineer Scotty,
Innocence has (at least) two definitions. One is the opposite of guilt. The other is more in the realm of how the “innocent” person sees the world. A more negative way to portray that sense of innocence is as naivete. Anyway, I take it this was how the father was using the term. Though, this all being a scam for money is something that occurs to me as well.

The besting seems well justified particularly if it was done when the son was caught in the act. The father had to do something to get the pervert to stop and if he had merely called the police the boy would have been subjected to more trauma.

My agreement with the father stops there. The boy was a victim of a horrible crime. He will need psychiatric treatment. Posting his abused son’s picture on Facebook to raise funds, claiming it is needed to restore his “innocence” (for what I do not know since he was a victim) is disturbing. If there is a hell (something we agnostics can’t really draw comfort from) and it is anything like that depicted in Dante’s Inferno, the rather and perversion should find themselves in the same circle of hell.vthey deserve one another.

“Is anyone troubled by the bit about “Help Restore My Son’s Innocence.”–not the attempt to raise $$$, but the suggestion that the child is now somehow defiled?”

Have you ever heard it said that that a child has “lost their innocence” after being exposed to extreme violence. Losing one’s innocence does not equal “defiled”.

Drew,

“I don’t want to spill too much digital ink being critical of this dad’s actions, which again I don’t have a huge problem with. But it just baffles me that some of you can interpret his actions as obviously morally superior to any other response.”

When folks discuss heated subjects usually a lot of emoting gets done, to the detriment of logic.

Would I have done something similar in that case? Probably. Would that have been the right thing to do? Probably not. I agree with you that even if something is “understandable” in a given situation, it doesn’t make it right.

Beating up the rapist does nothing to deter future attacks or mitigate the harm the boy has already suffered.

Someone who knows how it feels has already posted disagreement. I would add that beating up the rapist may well deter future attacks. To someone who feels an overwhelming compulsion to commit such acts, the thought, gee, if I get caught in the act I might be beaten unconscious is not an insignificant consideration. At the least, a prompt, violent, response ends the episode definitively. It may be therapeutic for the victim also — a graphic communication that the perp was wrong to do this to you, and its his fault, not yours.

I definitely support legal proceedings being very careful to consider all relevant circumstances. I favor any possible treatment over indefinite incarceration. I favor a well organized parole system that sincerely considers whether a given prisoner is ready for parole release, and does release them when they are. I think restorative justice has a lot to offer. I know that many young thugs are victims of circumstances beyond their control, and with the right response can become productive citizens. I also know that the first step in the right response can sometimes be a brick to the head — you have to get their attention first.

But here we are talking about something up close and personal. The man’s son was in the act of being raped by a trusted family friend. Killing him would have been overboard. Tearing him away and subduing the perp was unquestionably justified. Beating him unconscious? Well, as Cosimano says, the man is lucky the perp didn’t pull out a gun and shoot him. Best to render the perp unconscious before calling 9-1-1.

Did he deserve it? One could quibble, but he can hardly claim it was excessive. It was necessary, and not undeserved. A society lacking the surplus to support an extensive prison system would have killed him out of hand, not as justice, just self-defense.

“Such a story on so many levels. Given this case, the Zimmerman case, Florida is clearly a laboratory for the splendid neo-America that has been created by liberal intention and conservative cowardice.”

Interestingly not. Conservatives have had complete control of the Governor’s office, House, and Senate for nearly 20 years in Florida. This is straight up Florida at its best.

Kenneth said:

“I think the circumstances of the alleged rape and the immediate focus on making bank in the aftermath warrant a MUCH deeper investigation of the whole matter. Nothing about it adds up properly.”

You are quite correct.

I heard a report that Frolander had not been abusing the victim for three years like the report says. I read that he came on to the victim once three years ago but backed off when the victim said no and didn’t attempt again until just now.

Who knows, we may hear that the son is gay or curious and that the sex was consensual. (I know an 11 year old can’t give consent, you all know what I mean.)

As to the bit about making “bank” I can’t say. I certainly hope that such a protective father wouldn’t do something like this for financial gain but wouldn’t be terribly surprised if that was the case.

As a husband and father, I have to say that if I came home to discover a man raping my daughter and/or wife, after I immediately stopped him I would probably consider killing him and then claiming self defense. I live in a Castle Doctrine state. So, the burden of proof would be on the state to disprove my claim of self defense beyond a reasonable doubt. I’m a smart enough guy that I could figure out a way to make the physical evidence match my story – at least enough to discourage a prosecutor from bringing charges that would be a difficult jury sell even if the evidence were in the state’s favor. I don’t think I would actually do it, though, through a combination of risk-aversion and moral restraint by the grace of God. Now, if his knees or manly bits just happened to get stomped, crushed, or otherwise mangled in the struggle to subdue him… Well, all kinds of freak things can happen in a fight.

I’m a smart enough guy that I could figure out a way to make the physical evidence match my story

So let me get this straight. You already live in a state that skews the results in your favour. Despite that, you think nothing of fabricating evidence and, presumably, perjuring yourself – merely on “risk aversion” basis? (I presume you have no moral aversion to perjury or evidence tampering.) Your post reminded me of this – still relevant fifty years hence:

No moral, no message, no prophetic tract, just a simple statement of fact: for civilization to survive, the human race has to remain civilized.

The older man was 18 so if the son was 16 or 17 or if the son was 11 the other boy was 13 that might fly. and the Many states consider the age difference when considering the legal consent of a minor (nor friend/girlfriend, boyfriend/boyfriend, girlfriend/girlfriend).

The boy in this case was 11. I don’t think the consent excuse passes the laugh test.

For some reason this reminds me of the big ol’ combox fight that took place a couple years ago when that dad shot his daughter’s laptop and put it up on facebook. But this let me to the thought that the dad’s violence in this story is not really about parenting. Some of the euphemisms used here to describe child-rape ought to make this clear. Here’s the worst, in my opinion:

It risks teaching the boy that reacting with anger and violence is an appropriate way to mediate conflict.

I’m sorry Drew, but “mediate conflict?” I sympathize greatly with much of your sentiment in this, and I agree that the “ideal” response — let’s call it the “Vulcan response” — would have been simple incapacitation of the perpetrator. But I seriously can’t see any way to “turn the other cheek” on something like this, when one’s own child is being victimized in front of your eyes. The whole damn situation will leave scars — most people, I think, aren’t eager to beat up teenagers, and though I don’t think the dad or the kid should experience guilt over the beating, both of them will likely feel revulsion rather than satisfaction or glee in bringing the vision of the bloodied scumbag to mind.

The rapist was lucky the father was strong enough to beat him. A mother would have shot him dead. And she would be right. Killing monsters commiting atrocities is valid and just. How many children would this rapist assult before someone else did what should be done?

Is anyone troubled by the bit about “Help Restore My Son’s Innocence.”–not the attempt to raise $$$, but the suggestion that the child is now somehow defiled?

The kid was a rape victim. He’s a school-aged boy. He’s guilty of utterly nothing.

The belief in some quarters that rape victims (male or female, anal or vaginal), particularly those who lose their virginity in the process, are somehow defiled–is a belief that seriously needs to be discarded.

The child needs to be medically attended to, to make sure there’s no untreated physical injury or STD. He may or may not need psychological care after the assault.

But the suggestion that he is now impure or tainted is obnoxious.

I wanted to quote the whole thing. “Purity culture” is not something we discuss very often in this forum. “Loss of innocence” does have two meanings as others have stated, but in many evangelical communities the boy would be shamed by the focus on the loss of his purity. The shaming doesn’t have to be intentional for it to happen.

Smart spoke at a Johns Hopkins human trafficking forum, saying she was raised in a religious household and recalled a school teacher who spoke once about abstinence and compared sex to chewing gum.

“I thought, ‘Oh, my gosh, I’m that chewed up piece of gum, nobody re-chews a piece of gum, you throw it away.’ And that’s how easy it is to feel like you know longer have worth, you know longer have value,” Smart said. “Why would it even be worth screaming out? Why would it even make a difference if you are rescued? Your life still has no value.”

Victims of rape in purity culture are victimized again in the aftermath. There’s a ton more to say on this, but I don’t have a ton of time today.

=============

Also, burn this with fire:

Who knows, we may hear that the son is gay or curious and that the sex was consensual. (I know an 11 year old can’t give consent, you all know what I mean.)

And the response right along with it:

But wait…men that rape boys aren’t ‘gay’. At least that’s what the great and good have been telling us for 40 years.

Former Cleveland Police Department Sgt. Chad Langdon, who was the lead investigator on the case, also testified that an 11-year-old – due to her emotional immaturity – legally cannot give consent for a sexual encounter.

Taylor questioned why the underage girl had not been charged with anything for choosing to violate that rule, indicating that she was “the reason” that the encounters happened.

“Like the spider and the fly. Wasn’t she saying, ‘Come into my parlor, said the spider to the fly?’ ” Taylor asked.

“I wouldn’t call her a spider,” Langdon replied. “I’d say she was just an 11-year-old girl.”

The father’s immediate response is understandable, even if his rage caused him to do more damage to the rapist than was strictly necessary to end the assault. I certainly would be hard pressed to convict the father if I were on a jury trying his case. Problem is, he didn’t stop with beating up the rapist. Putting his son’s picture on Facebook to collect money was despicable, and a psychological assault upon the son who he initially tried to protect. I’d like to see both the father and the rapist sentenced to spend 10 years as cell mates. They truly deserve each other. I’m an avowed atheist, but things like this make me wish I was wrong so these people can get proper punishment.

Perhaps you missed the phrase immediately following “risk aversion”: “and moral restraint by the grace of God.” But I suppose it’s hard to see the text clearly from all the way up there on that high horse…

I’m not foolish enough to believe that I would not be tempted to do the exact same thing this father did to his son’s assailant, or worse. Nor am I foolish enough to believe that I would ultimately make the right decision out of completely pure motives. Any father who says he wouldn’t be tempted to kill a criminal like this is a liar. God protect me and my family from ever being tested in this manner, and God protect each of us from our own depravity.